Roosters aim to cry Wolves in East Premier Shield final

Paul Ashbridge is confident St Ives Roosters can clinch some silverware when they take on Milton Keynes Wolves in the East Premier Shield final at Letchworth.

Roosters hammered Milton Keynes 90-12 at home in their Co-Operative Rugby League Conference, East Division showdown in May.

However, while the player-coach believes St Ives will again be too strong for Wolves, he said he was wary of the side they would field.

He said: “We scored 90 points last time, so we’re quietly confident of beating them again if they put out their usual team.

“But they have a tendency of finding a few ringers from out of the woodwork when the game matters.

“We went down there last year and even with a half-strength team we should have beaten them, but they’d pulled in a lot of players from Hemel and we got beaten, so I’ll be having a close look at their teamsheet before we play.”

It will be a quick return to Letchworth, the home of North Herts Crusaders, having lost 48-18 away to the division leaders last Saturday.

And Ashbridge hopes conditions will be slightly different after losing several players to knocks in the second half on a rock hard pitch.

He said: “It was 29 degrees, there was no grass on the pitch whatsoever and every so often someone was going down with a hamstring injury.

“Even the referee said if it had been in the winter, it would have been called off because it was the same as playing on a frozen pitch.

“In the summer it’s supposed to be fine, but it would have been nice if it had been watered a bit.

“But we just let ourselves go a little bit and with the injuries and the heat, people just got a bit lacklustre.”

Ashbridge said he did not expect those who suffered injuries to be ruled out for the final, but James Bennett is unavailable as he will be at his graduation ceremony.

Dave Baker, Ollie Bartlett and Jim Robinson are all expected to be back in action after missing the Crusaders game.